


Midnight Visitor

by ELVincent



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Cuddling & Snuggling, Declarations Of Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Families of Choice, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jealousy, Lesbian Sex, Love, Mental Health Issues, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Past Abuse, Possessive Behavior, Requited Love, Rough Kissing, Rough Sex, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-28
Updated: 2015-08-28
Packaged: 2018-04-17 17:06:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4674620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ELVincent/pseuds/ELVincent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"When a woman unexpectedly appears in your bedchamber in the middle of the night, there are only two possible purposes for her visit," she'd said, but even H.G. Wells can be wrong sometimes.  Particularly when the topic is human behavior rather than scientific innovation.</p><p>Helena Wells has a series of unexpected midnight visitors. Set sometime in late Season 4.</p><p>Chapter 1 - Teen & Up<br/>Chapters 2 - General Audiences<br/>Chapter 3 - Explicit<br/>Chapter 4 - General Audiences</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Claudia

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warnings: references to physical and sexual violence, prostitution and suicidal thoughts.
> 
> Tags for this chapter: non-sexual intimacy, love, hurt/comfort, emotional hurt/comfort, past abuse, implied/referenced child abuse, families of choice, mental health issues, cuddling & snuggling.

"When a woman unexpectedly appears in your bedchamber in the middle of the night, there are only two possible purposes for her visit." Helena wasn't sure how the topic had become breakfast conversation, but here they were, discussing such risqué matters over fresh pastries and strawberry preserves. She glanced toward Myka, who hid a guilty smile behind her cup of earl grey tea. 

"Hey hey, I know one of them!" Pete exclaimed as he piled three croissants onto his plate and stuffed a fourth into his mouth. 

"Mention 'little Pete' and I'll bronze both of you." The unusual caustic edge to Claudia's voice was lost on Pete, but not on the other agents, who exchanged glances that ranged from vaguely concerned (Myka) to exasperated (Jinx). 

Helena kept her own expression neutral, noting the telltale signs of sleeplessness when Claudia tossed her sunglasses onto the table to rub at her kohl-lined eyes. Jinx pushed a plate with a steaming buttered pastry across the table, but his fingers were hardly off the rim before Claudia shoved it back.

"Thanks Jinxy, but watching Pete scarf those down is killing my appetite. Plus you know the Claudia-empire runs on coffee." 

Helena wasn't convinced, particularly when she saw the mug in Claudia's hand bobble slightly. She knew what lack of food and sleep could do to a person. Too long and even the most brilliant mind will buckle under the strain. Quite inconvenient, really, the physical needs of bodies.

Helena was struck by the impulse to scrub the dear girl's face and tuck her into bed. She decided it was a sign of personal growth that stripping Claudia naked wasn't part of the plan. 

"I'm just saying, there's only ever been one reason a woman would sneak into my room, and his name is PETE JUNIOR, Claudia."

"And what if she's not there to fuck you?" Claudia pointedly ignored Pete, instead keeping her eyes on Helena, who smiled as if recalling a particularly fond memory. 

"Then she's there to kill you."

\---

Three nights later at around 2 in the morning, the third floorboard from the door creaked and Helena's eyes shot open. She neutralized the intruder easily, springing from bed, hooking an arm around the other woman's throat and pressing a tesla into the soft flesh of her neck. 

Helena's cat-like reflexes had kept her alive for a century, more or less, and she had seen her fair share of midnight callers. 

Oh, fine. Quite possibly it was more than her fair share. 

They stayed that way for several long moments, one's pulse thudding a staccato rhythm against the barrel of the gun, the other observing with a steely gaze. The inventor blinked slowly in the dim light, her body relaxing even though her finger remained on the trigger. The two of them were crushed together close enough for Helena to smell the hint of some modern bath product lingering on her captive's skin. 

"Apples," she murmured. Convinced the slight figure was, in fact, exactly who she appeared to be, Helena lowered the weapon. 

By the time she'd placed it on the nightstand, she suspected she knew exactly where the moment was heading. This was a complication that, while certainly intriguing, might get her in serious trouble with her... Other complication. 

Although it wasn't as if they'd agreed to be exclusive complications, and sometimes taking a new lover revitalized one's other relationships. 

At least, that was how Helena justified not turning the girl away immediately. The inventor sat on the bed, then folded her hands in her lap and waited for her visitor to speak. 

"You seem awfully relaxed considering there's a 50/50 shot I'm here to kill you." The shadow stepped forward, moonlight from the window illuminating pale skin. 

"As unlikely it is that you have come to "fuck" me, as you so charmingly put it, I believe it's even less likely you're planning to murder me."

"I'd like a third option."

Curious, but intriguing. 

"Then have it." Helena gestured to a place beside her on the bed but the girl hesitated, then slid a chair over and sank down into it. 

"I can't sleep." Claudia picked at the threadbare olive fabric that covered the arm of the chair. She opened her mouth to speak, closed it again, shifted her weight from one hip to another. 

The gentle shape the girl's body curled into in the chair made her look very young and very old simultaneously. She'd tucked one foot underneath her while the other rested haphazardly on the floor. She slouched, arms crossed over her chest, partially obscuring the image on her dark t-shirt. 

Helena was amused to note that Claudia's nightclothes were merely a less-layered version of her daytime look. Her pale legs were partially obscured by a loose-fitting knit bloomer (Helena thought the garment would be good kempo attire). The t-shirt was printed with a garish illustration of a mouth and tongue. It had a hole in the sleeve and it hung on Claudia a bit, as if she'd lost weight or perhaps stolen it from a lover. 

It wasn't until that moment that Helena realized she knew nothing of Claudia's lovers, or even if she'd had any at all. She'd heard all about Pete's exploits, both secondhand from Myka and directly from Pete himself, who justified the oversharing with an odd circular logic. ("So you're kinda like a dude because everybody thinks you're a dude, so I'm just going to pretend you're a dude. Who just happens to have breasts.") 

She and Myka had spent many long nights trading stories about the people in their pasts. Helena loved how girlish she felt laying in the dark under a blanket with the warmth of Myka's body next to hers, as she delighted in listening to the agent recount every detail of a college tryst or an old heartbreak. 

Helena could name two women Artie had loved and she knew all about the man who grew older, breaking perpetually youthful Lena's heart. Even the reserved Steve Jinks had spoken to her about an ex-boyfriend at some length one night, out in the garden as they sipped glasses of scotch in the cool night air.

Yet somehow she knew nothing of Claudia's history. She didn't even know if Claudia preferred men or women. (How dull that a hundred years later humanity clung to such distinctions, but it was what it was.)

"You okay, HG? You were a million miles away." The arm of the chair was unraveling in earnest under Claudia's nimble fingers. "Penny for your thoughts?"

"I was wondering if you'd ever taken a lover."

"Yikes. Guess that'll teach me not to ask questions I'm not sure I want answers to," Claudia mumbled, a berry-hued flush rising on her cheeks. 

"My apologies, Claudia. It really is none of my business."

"Whatever."

"So what is your third option?"

"I just... I wanted to talk." Brown eyes ping-ponged from the cracks in the ceiling to the arm of the chair. "How do you sleep, knowing that there's a part of you that wants to destroy the world?"

Helena tensed for the first time since she'd put the Tesla away. 

"Sometimes I don't. The rest of the time, I try to remind myself that the part of me that caused such turmoil did so because it was... because I was in terrible pain."

Claudia slumped back in the chair, inhaling slowly. She stared out the window for a moment, as if the proper response lurked just past the smudged double paned glass, before dragging herself back into the present. 

The kohl had been washed away, but even barefaced Claudia still looked older than her years. There was a weight around her eyes, a gravitas that was unexpected but somehow not out of place. She looked like a woman who'd lived through things that mere mortals do not survive. 

They had that in common. 

"Is there part of you that wants to destroy the world, Claudia?"

"Yes." Behind the low, even tone of voice thrummed an energy that Helena knew well. An innocuous word, said in the dark of night, and threads reached across the gap to weave a connection between them. 

"What makes you say this?"

"Some nights, just when I've almost fallen asleep but am still just a little bit aware, I think about doing things I shouldn't. Hurting people."

At this, her face crumpled and Helena could not resist the urge to embrace her. Claudia let herself be tugged over to the bed. The inventor lay down beside her, wrapping arms tightly around her for the second time that night. The young woman's body twitched and the tension in her limbs remained, but the heavy sigh that burst from her chest was a grateful one.

When she broke the silence several minutes later, Claudia's voice was small but clear. "I haven't, you know. Had a lover. I'm not a virgin or anything like that but I wouldn't say that anyone I've slept with has earned the right to be called my lover."

"That's a clever girl-- both for seeing the distinction and for trying to distract me from asking more questions by changing to a racy topic."

"It was that obvious?"

"You'll not get away that easily. Who do you imagine yourself hurting?"

"I keep wondering what kind of person I would have been if my parents had lived," Claudia went on as if Helena's last question had not been asked. "If I would have done normal things like taking a school field trip to the museum or going to the prom, or if the thing that’s wrong with me has been wrong all along. If the dark parts of me spawned from what came after, or if the potential for destruction was inborn."

"Any conclusions?"

A long slow exhale. "None. I lived in seven different foster homes in five years. Five of them were fine, decent people, but even decent people move or have babies of their own and they can't keep extraneous kids around. Dad number six was not so considerate and sent me to school with black eyes and bruises shaped like his fingers on my arm. It took seven months before anyone noticed." She laughed bitterly and pulled Helena's arms more tightly around her. "Family number seven was the best, though, because they thought they’d hit the jackpot. I was sixteen and they looked at me like was just a fucking revenue stream, and I mean the "fucking" part literally."

"I am so sorry, Claudia."

"Don't be. I figured out what was going on before too much damage was done and I bolted."

"To where?"

"Anywhere. Nowhere. I did my best to find places to sleep that were out of the wind. If I was really lucky I'd find one safe enough to close my eyes in. During the day I played my guitar in the metro for tips and made enough that way to stay fed. Most of the time."

"There was this one day that I'd been playing for hours but no one was putting anything in the case. I had, like, $1.75 in there, enough for a coffee and not much else, and I was starting to seriously think about taking a walk to the bridge, then one extra step, that sort of thing."

"Long tragic boring story short, some suit comes by later that day and wants to give me $100 to go home with him. A hundred dollars is a fortune when you're used to playing for loose change."

"I'd imagine."

"I told him no, that I didn't do that, and he doubled it. Enough to buy a bus ticket, get the fuck out of there, start over somewhere better." Claudia noted Helena's concerned expression and waved it away. "Don't worry, I declined. I was desperate but that was a line I couldn't cross, even if it would have paid for a bed and a hot meal. Stupid, right?"

"Not at all. I think you behaved admirably."

"Surviving at all is admirable. I was just scared."

"Scared or not, you lived."

"Barely. That night, I woke up to find this kid going through my bag. My age, probably just as desperate as I was. I didn't have anything for him to steal, but when he realized I was awake he pulled out this huge knife and..."

"And?"

"And I was pretty sure I was going to die."

"But you didn't."

"Obvs. The kid was jittery, coming down from something, angry I didn't have any money. He starts to come at me with the knife and I should have dodged, I knew I could outrun him, but he still had my fucking bag in his other hand. Everything I owned in the world was in that backpack."

"I didn't run. I was just frozen, watching. He came toward me with the knife and it was... it was the bridge coming to me."

"Oh, Claudia."

"Don't get all girly on me, H.G. Obviously I did not commit suicide by meth head."

"So you ran."

"Not exactly. I thought I passed out, lack of food plus terror and all that jazz. When I came to, my backpack was in my arms and the kid was laying on the ground, unconscious. The suit who'd tried to pick me up earlier that day was there, helping me up."

"He was saying something about how I had a bus to catch and then he pressed this envelope into my hands. It was full of money, way more than $200, and there was a ticket to Sioux Falls, South Dakota. I was totally weirded out, I tried to ask him who the hell he was, but he hailed a cab and told the driver to take me to the bus station. Next thing I knew I was on the bus, wondering how the universe knew I needed an escape route. Weird, right?"

"Yes, that does seem like an unusual experience."

"Although, warehouse. And there's something I remembered a few days ago that I’m having a really hard time processing. The man who saved me, he was wearing this little gold pin with the Eye of Horus on it. Pretty big coincidence, don't you think?”

“When it comes to the warehouse, there are no coincidences.”

“If the Regents knew about me back then, why didn't they step in before I was shivering in an alleyway like the fucking little matchstick girl?"

"The regents work in mysterious ways, Claudia."

"I'm pretty sure I was supposed to die that night. But they needed me alive."

"That may be. We certainly did."

Claudia pulled away and rolled over to face her. “I try to be useful.” The words were murmured, but when the girl intentionally avoided her gaze, Helena heard the meaning quite clearly. 

“If one day you’re no longer “useful,” as you put it, do you think that we’ll expect you to leave?”

“I hope not.” A laugh that didn’t reach her eyes. “Not like Artie could run this place without me, right?”

“I highly doubt it. But even if he could, he wouldn’t want to. He loves you.”

“Gross.”

“No jokes. We all love you, Claudia. This family is yours, always.” Helena threaded her fingers through Claudia’s. “You will not be asked to leave it, even if you do try to destroy the world. I know from experience.”


	2. Leena

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When a woman shows up in your bedroom in the middle of the night, she's there for one of two reasons. Or three.
> 
> Unless, that is, she's dead, in which case Helena assumes there's a fourth option, but Lena's not talking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: canonical character death.

When a woman shows up in your bedroom in the middle of the night, she's there for one of two reasons. Or three.

Unless, that is, she's dead, in which case Helena assumes there's a fourth option, but Lena's not talking. 

Based on the anecdotes she'd heard about ghosts, Helena anticipated a drop in temperature, strange kinetic happenings or flickering of lights to accompany the quiet specter, but all Lena brought with her was a sunset orange glow that softly illuminated the darkened room. 

The glow and the smell of freshly baked cookies. 

Helena sat with her back against the headboard as Lena lingered at the foot, smiling like she knew what was coming next and it was going to be wonderful. 

"You're not far off."

"So I suppose that means ghosts are telepathic?"

"If I meet one, I'll ask," and at that Lena laughed like church bells and sat down on the corner of the bed. Helena noted that a dip appeared in the mattress where Lena's weight would be, if she was alive and not a translucent echo of what she once was, an echo that shimmered and disappeared in places where the flesh and blood woman would have been soft and warm. 

Helena wanted to ask, 'how are you' but as small talk went it seemed in poor taste, so she said nothing. 

"They're fragile," Lena said quietly. "They're still young. They haven't lost people the way you and I have."

"They might be young, but they've all grieved. Pete's father, Myka's lover, Steve's older sister, Claudia's entire family---"

"Family. That's the important thing, isn't it?"

Helena's fingers found the locket around her neck and worried the edge near the catch. 

"Yes. Loving people can make you very vulnerable," Lena replied to the thought that flickered across Helena's mind, dragging memories of Christina with it. 

Christina laughing. Christina demanding, then requesting, then pleading for just one more chapter before bed. Christina deathly pale and oddly swollen in her coffin. 

Helena waited to be angry but after several long moments she only felt the gnawing chill of grief. 

"So what are we to do?" When Lena did not respond, Helena reached for her, she supposed to shake her and demand an answer, but her hand cut right through. She watched as her fingers seemed to phase in and out, becoming non-corporeal as they passed through Lena's shoulder. 

The phantom shuddered. Helena's palm tingled as her molecules congealed themselves back into real matter. 

"What are we to do?" She asked again. Lena shook her head. 

"I wish I knew."


	3. Myka

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When a woman shows up unexpectedly in your room in the middle of the night-- well, that isn't really applicable this time, is it? Because perhaps the first time a thing happens, it's an accident. The second time, an indiscretion. But by the third time it's a habit, and by the hundredth it's an addiction, and Helena?
> 
> Helena is a full blown, jonesing, scheming addict. 
> 
> Or perhaps she's the drug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bering & Wells. Angsty smut with a bit of fluff. Tags for this chapter: rough kissing, possessive behavior, rough sex, smut, jealousy, lesbian sex, explicit sex.

When a woman shows up unexpectedly in your room in the middle of the night-- well, that isn't really applicable this time, is it? Because perhaps the first time a thing happens, it's an accident. The second time, an indiscretion. But by the third time it's a habit, and by the hundredth it's an addiction, and Helena?

Helena is a full blown, jonesing, scheming addict. 

Or perhaps she's the drug. 

"I understand you had a lot of company this week." Myka's tone is one of teasing, but there's an undertone of reprimand that warms Helena. 

They haven't talked about... this... since the first time Myka crept into the room. That time Helena didn't wake up until Myka's hands were on her. Without the agent's quick reflexes she would have had a black eye to explain away in the morning. But Myka had dodged, grabbed Helena's wrists, and kissed her. 

Helena struggled for an extra moment, even after she knew her midnight caller was no assassin, but Myka held her firmly and so she submitted, lips becoming warm and pliable, hands plunging into tangled curls. 

Helena wondered if she'd lost her edge but she knew, even before the incident with Claudia proved it, that only one soul could catch her that unaware. The rhythm of Myka's footsteps was coded into her DNA; it was as much background noise as her own heartbeat. 

That incident with Claudia was, no doubt, what made Myka's eyes blaze so brightly tonight. She'd never put restrictions on Helena. They both knew it would ruin them, and up until then Helena's wandering eyes (or hands) hadn't been an issue. 

They still weren't, but Myka didn't know that. Behind that wickedly smart, bookish amazon exterior, she was just insecure enough to be rattled by it. It had been six days since she saw a bleary-eyed Claudia leaving Helena's room, and Myka had spent much of that time obsessing, coming up with and discounting innocent reasons the redhead could have been there. 

When she ran out of innocent reasons, she started in on the tawdry ones, until a mental picture of the two of them, a sprawl of naked limbs, derailed her day entirely. 

Myka had no right to confront Helena about this, but she was going to do it anyway. 

Had Helena known that Myka's jealous streak was so maddeningly attractive, she would have invited Claudia for a sleepover months ago. 

"I don't know what counts as 'a lot' of company these days. You see, in 1897, even one midnight caller was positively scandalous." The corners of her lips twitched up and she let her eyes roam Myka's lithe form, making her gaze blatantly obvious. "One would think the guidelines would have relaxed by now."

"Relax, Helena. I'm not calling you a slut." Myka plopped down into the armchair that Claudia had picked apart, crossing her legs coquettishly. "You're an adult. You are free to do whatever you want."

"Ah. With whomever?" 

"I don't tell you what to do."

"Oh, but you could. You could demand that I confess to you every single detail of the night I spent with Claudia, and I would, holding back only the moments that aren't mine to reveal. I'd beg for your forgiveness, which you'd grant, reluctantly, after you'd assigned a suitable punishment."

There was a heaviness in Helena's voice that went straight to Myka's gut. She was angrier than when she arrived, now that Helena had all but confirmed that she'd fucked Claudia, but that anger was tempered with intense, almost painful desire. 

Helena could have fucked the entire Univille marching band and Myka would have still wanted her. 

Myka might have preferred she fuck the marching band, actually, because the marching band wasn't sitting at the breakfast table every morning, smiling at Helena like they were sharing a dangerous secret. 

(And Myka had never had inadvertent, lecherous, guilt-inducing thoughts after accidentally walking in on the marching band getting out of the shower, either.)

"And what would you consider a suitable punishment, Helena?"

"I couldn't say. After all, I don't believe I broke any rules. But you'd have to be the judge of that. What if I tell you what might have happened, hypothetically, and you can deduce a punishment from there?"

Myka's breathing was shallow and quick. She looked up at Helena, who very deliberately began to unbutton her nightshirt, letting it fall open, casually exposing the bare skin underneath.

"It may be that she came to me in the middle of the night. I woke when she was here," she gestured, tugging Myka out of the chair and to a spot quite close to the door. "She took one step more before I had her in my grip, with the tip of my tesla pressed right here." Helena stepped behind Myka, holding her firmly with one arm while the other tapped lightly on the side of Myka's neck. 

"And then?" The agent's voice cracked as she leaned back into Helena's rough embrace. 

"It took me several moments to be sure that she was who she seemed to be, at which point I released her. She referenced my earlier statement about how there was a 50/50 chance she was there to kill me, but I told her I wasn't concerned."

"Because you already knew why she was there."

"I thought I did. Her purpose was more complicated than I'd imagined."

"I see." 

"I put the Tesla away, then sat here on the bed."

"And then?"

"Then she sat in that chair and asked me some rather intimate questions. At a certain point in the conversation, I pulled her into bed with me." Helena turned them, walking backwards slowly until they reached the bed, drawing the agent with her. Myka, clearly angry, hesitated for a moment before she allowed the other woman to tug her down into an embrace. Helena curled toward her and Myka mirrored her movements, entangling their hands, their faces inches apart. 

"Did she resist?"

"No."

"She's always been a smart girl. What happened next?"

"I suspect you know already."

"I'd rather hear it from you."

"Well, I think you know she didn't leave my arms until the next morning."

Anger flared up in Myka. Helena felt it traveling between them where their hands intertwined and knees touched, through the ankle that was looped over Myka's, and across the space between their lips. A space that was growing smaller by the second. 

Had Myka looked hurt or like she felt betrayed, Helena would have confessed the ruse instantly, but all she could see in the other woman's eyes was a fierce possessiveness that blistered and burned. Interesting. She took a deep breath and forged on. 

"Hypothetically, if I had been touched by another, or touched another, I could imagine that you would want to reassert your right to what is yours."

"And what is mine?" They'd never come so close to talking about it, and Helena wasn't going to be the one who flinched. 

"All of me that you're prepared to lay claim to." Helena leaned closer, her ruby lips almost touching Myka's, her eyes full of challenge. "Take me back," she whispered, and at that Myka flipped them over so Helena was pinned underneath her. 

Helena struggled, reminded again of that first time when it felt so delicious to resist and then relent. She kissed Myka desperately, losing her breath when the curly haired agent thrust a hand down the front of her pants. In another situation it might have been too soon, but their conversation had been foreplay for her mind, and Helena's body had responded. Myka's fingers slid across her clit, prompting a shiver, before dipping lower to enter her. 

"Yes, darling. Make me forget every other person who's come before you."

Myka nipped at her jawline before leaning close to her ear. "Claudia is off limits," she hissed, punctuating the statement with a rough thrust. "Got that?"

"Yes." She smirked. "Jealous, darling?"

"No."

"You needn't be," she gasped, arching her body up to meet Myka's hand. "She can't compare to you."

"No one compares to me."

"If course not. Although having her lithe, delicate body next to mine was almost as delicious."

The barb had the effect Helena had hoped for, and Myka's thrusts grew harder, and more erratic. The inventor glanced down, shivering at the visual of Myka's hand disappearing beneath her waistband. 

"But she didn't do you like this, did she, Helena?"

"Oh, not quite." 

"I thought better of you. She's practically a child."

"She's no such thing, but that isn't the point really, is it? You're harping on Claudia when this isn't really about her at all."

"Then what is it about?" A hiss, a shift, a pop of fireworks behind Helena's eyes and her hands groping in her blindness, one snaking under Myka's shirt to pluck urgently at the rosy peak of her breast, the other scrambling lower. 

"It's about this," she said as her fingers zeroed in on their destination. Myka arched up, gasped, her eyes going glassy. Helena's rush of satisfaction that she had been the one to do that was short lived, replaced moments later by a new surge of pleasure. "I wouldn't know your body better if I'd built it myself. I've mapped every inch of you in my sleep, waking drenched in sweat, reaching out for you. I had a hundred years in bronze and I couldn't have dreamed of a more perfect woman. I couldn't have invented one."

At this, Myka made a noise that was a combination of a whine and a purr. Helena pressed their lips together, her tongue mirroring the thrusting of their fingers. She wanted desperately to put her mouth to other use, to taste Myka, to spend hours wringing every ounce of pleasure out of her, but she knew her lover needed this primal, immediate release. To her mild surprise and considerable satisfaction, she felt her own peak building quickly as Myka's deft hands ministered to her. 

"There can be no one but you. There has been no one but you in a hundred years. You have ruined me. You could end this right now and I would spend the rest of my life craving your touch. I would compare every new lover I took to you and they would be found lacking, because some cosmic engineer designed me for you, and only you."

Myka's breath was ragged and sweat glistened on her brow. Helena looked up and thought she saw the barest hint of wetness in the corners of Myka's eyes, but then the curly haired brunette was shuddering, clenching around her fingers, and calling out her name. The moaned "Helena" reverberated in the inventor's gut, and a few moments later she felt herself tipping over the edge. She thrashed under Myka, incoherent half-words spilling from her mouth as she crested. 

Helena always enjoyed bedding Myka, but the rush of being so vulnerable, of daring to confront the implications of Myka's midnight visits, heightened her senses. Her carefully cultivated defenses were shattered and for a few moments she was blissfully unaware of anything but Myka, next to her and inside her, and then the world dissolved until there was not even that. 

Helena did not know how long they laid there, tangled in each others arms and breathing raggedly. Myka was no longer on top of her, but next to her, naked and clutching her fiercely. When Helena opened her eyes, Myka was staring at her, an unreadable expression on her face.

"Penny for your thoughts," Helena said. She knew that no matter what the answer was, she wanted to hear it. 

"No one but me in a hundred years?"

"Don't look so surprised." 

"I just assumed that..." Myka's eyes were cast downward and her body had stiffened slightly in Helena's embrace. 

Helena willed herself not to worry that she'd ruined everything. She took a deep breath before she replied. 

"Only you." 

Their eyes met and Helena had never felt quite so exposed. Then Myka was kissing her, hard, chasing out her fears. 

Later, after a leisurely, passion-filled encore to their first manic coupling, Helena rested her head on Myka's shoulder. She was sated and drowsy and it took her a moment to parse the words that broke the silence.

"I'm sorry," the agent said quietly. 

"Whatever for? Your performance was near flawless."

"I was... angry. And I had no right to be." 

Helena, now fully awake, pulled her lover closer. "No, you didn't. But I was glad that you were."

"So why does a woman come to your bed in the middle of the night, if it's not to kill you or fuck you?"

"It turns out, I was wrong. Those aren't the only two things a midnight caller might desire. She was hurting and needed comfort. Reassurance that we loved her despite her flaws." 

"She has seemed better since she spent the night with you."

"Well, nights with me do tend to cheer people up." Helena paused, eyes searching Myka's face. "You actually believed I did something untoward with her." At the other woman's embarrassed expression, Helena laughed and shook her head. "I won't lie, I considered it. But I do not think I could have, even if that had been her aim." 

"Well, I'm glad I didn't humiliate myself by asking her about it."

"She would have told you the truth, doubtless."

"Yes, but can you imagine--- a grown woman holding a teenager to the wall and screaming, 'If you ever touch the woman I love again, so help me god I will end you?'"

"I love you too," Helena replied, a smile dancing on her lips. "Although to be honest, I don't believe that counts as 'asking.'" 

The last thing Helena was aware of before drifting off to sleep were Myka's fingers absentmindedly circling one of her nipples as the agent grumbled something about semantics.


	4. Mrs. Frederick

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When a woman shows up in your bedroom in the middle of the night, she's there for one of several reasons that one should probably not ascribe without a thorough investigation of the situation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, this one is strictly G-rated, kids.

When a woman shows up in your bedroom in the middle of the night, she's there for one of several reasons that one should probably not ascribe without a thorough investigation of the situation. 

"Ms. Wells," the voice said and she sat bolt upright, clutching the sheet to cover herself. 

She'd say she was losing her edge but there are some people who cannot be prepared for and who leave no trace when they go. 

"Yes?"

"You have a new assignment. You'll leave in the morning." A perfectly manicured hand dropped a file on the bedside table before lightly tracing the edge of the Tesla that rested there. 

"Had I known you kept it within arms reach, I might have knocked."

"Of course you would have."

"Perhaps. Perhaps not."

"Well, not that it's done me much good recently."

"I hope that's because all your visitors have been welcome, if not necessarily expected."

"Yes. They have been more friend than foe in recent times."

"Good. I hope the trend continues."

"I hope it has."

The two stared at each other for several long moments before Mrs. Frederick's stony visage softened into a smile. Her eyes flickered past Helena to the mass of tangled curls on the pillow next to her. 

"She snores."

"Yes. And she sporadically makes the strangest noises. Almost like an asthmatic pig."

Helena waited for the older woman to reply; when she didn't, the Brit opened the file and pretended to scan the information. 

"Don't worry-- you'll be gone a day, two at most."

"Why would I worry?"

"Oh that's right. You know better than to get attached. Helena Wells, ready for anything good to be over in an instant." Mrs Frederick turned and took a step toward the door before calling back to Helena. "Family is family, Helena. You'd do well to take your own advice."

"How did you--" Helena's words trailed off as she realized Mrs. Frederick was long gone. She glanced down at Myka, who was stirring. 

"'Oo was 'at?" The question came, mumbled from beneath the quilt. 

"Mrs Frederick. I have to leave in the morning." At the squawk of protest, the inventor reached over, gliding her fingers gently over a patch of exposed shoulder. "Don't worry. I won't be away from home for long."

And she meant it.


End file.
